| Travel & Books |

#Gratitude: Challenges for a bloggers pen -The Good!

October 12, 2018

As I began to get more proficient at posting content on my blog, I started to look up the blogging challenges in the blogosphere that seemed to garner tonnes of attention. I have whetted down my list to partaking in three every year, though there are tonnes of them out there.

Blogging challenges are a great way to push the pen as far as one can. It builds up good writing discipline plus improves the writing. Interacting with other bloggers, helps you gauge your own skill set while learn from others.

I will take you through the good, bad and ugly of all the blogging challenges I did and how it went for me. Let me start with the Good first…….

A to Z challenge

This challenge rolls around April of every year and is one of the best that I have done so far (done it twice and loved every day of it). The crux of the challenge is to write daily for 26 days of the month (no posting on Sundays) and every post begins with the Alphabet in a consecutive manner. It gets easier if one chooses a theme or genre to write about as it lets one build up momentum in the writing. Readers also find it easier to connect with a theme as there is a continuation in the posts thereon.

Here the trick is to have great theme/content – goes without saying. Reading others is a great way to let the others know you are there in the challenge too. Plus the interaction with bloggers out of your usual circle, helps one build the blogging network.

Some bloggers do feel a burnout after such a challenge is over but I have loved it every time around and am gearing up for the next one. The key is preparing the posts in advance as one needs to read daily and reply back to every comment on one’s posts too.

This challenge does not promote numbers/ranking at all. I have met/interacted with some awesome bloggers, been introduced so fantastic writings and learnt a lot of tricks and tips from the pros. Best part is that there is no forced reading here.

♥ A huge thumbs up to this blogging challenge – a must do if you wish to connect with a bigger circle of bloggers ♥

BAR-A-THON

BAR is a great blogging community that hosts a blogging marathon every year in June – July where in 7-10 prompts/themes are lined up in advance. Bloggers can sign up for this challenge and need to follow guidelines for their posts, posting on the thread and showing love to others participating in the challenge. The posting schedule is set out in advance and one can accordingly set up a writing/posting discipline for one’s blog.

It’s a great way to challenge one’s writing as the prompts really get you to think creatively. Since lots of people will be writing on one prompt, there is such a huge variety on how each tackles the prompt. Each post is so creative and original.

I have participated twice in this and loved it every time around as the prompts are very whacky and can be interpreted in a multitude of ways. Again no forced reading and one can read as many or as little as one has time/inclination for.

♥ Do keep a look out for this one and see if its your cup of tea………………..er……..coffee 😉 ♥

Write tribe Festival Of Words

WT comes up with a blogging marathon every year in July-August and divvies up the bloggers into groups with one group leader. The leader’s job is to ensure everyone follows the rules and shows plenty of love to the other blogs in the group. A pre-requisite of this challenge is to read everyone in one’s group. This is a way to ensure fair and impartial visits to everyone’s blog during the festival.

The posting schedule is set and there are prompts/theme notified in advance. Again, the fun is in reading varying views on the same prompt.

I attempted this challenge one time in 2017 and though I loved the prompts and writings, I had a few issues which made me stay away from it in 2018.

In a group of say 15 bloggers, some bloggers had two blogs. So while 14 bloggers had to show love to 14 blogs per prompt, one blogger had only 13 to visit. It gets tedious reading over a number of days, though may seem like a very petty issue. I wished that each group would have single blog of every blogger and if there were any with another/more blog, it could have been put into another group. That would have been the fair thing to do. I mean, the idea is to promote one’s blog by showing equal love to other blogs.So if you have 2 blogs, shouldnt you read twice the number? Thats just the way I think.

My second issue was the number of Mommy bloggers in the mix; I abhor reading mommy blogs as the topic is least bit interesting plus 99% of such blogs are pushing a product/brand which makes the reading even more dreary. I wished for a more niche wise grouping or at least putting the mommy ones into one group – I can read almost every topic; but not this one. And I have found company in this grouse 🙂

Lastly, the enforced reading meant I couldnt read my favourite bloggers who were in other groups. I simply couldnt keep up with reading 14 blogs daily and add some more to it. It also meant I read some very insipid writings as some in the group couldnt hold my interest. Also, lots of people in the group couldnt cope with the reading numbers, leading to a disgruntled feeling of I-read-all-but-eveyrone-didnt-read-me. It felt like reading by number and that for me defeated the whole purpose of being part of a blogging challenge.

Made a note to self to check it out next year to see if there is any improvement in the rules 🙂

♥ I classify this under good, even though I have had a few perosnal issues here ♥

17 thoughts on “#Gratitude: Challenges for a bloggers pen -The Good!”

100% with you about “mommy” blogs. Wish we would’ve enough “daddy” blogs around. That could’ve made a little dent on the ceiling. I participated one blogging challenge this year (my first) and already looking for more. Thank you for providing the list. Never heard any of them before. The Bar-A-Thon sounds super exciting.

I haven’t really tried any writing challenges other than writing blog posts on particular topics (like the Flash Fiction Challenge for example). But I’m not really sure how I’d do with it considering if you have to write a lot of posts in advance. I want to try one of them these days to see what it’s like, but I just always seem to forget about them though whenever they do come around.

Ah well AtoZ is slightly tough as it leads to 26 days of non stop blogging; I would suggest taking part in it next year to see how you like it. Planning a few posts in advance keeps one on schedule; to date I havent managed to write all the posts in advance. Some do – but I like to enjoy what I am doing. So what I do is pre-plan the graphics/topics, etc and then write on the go.

BAR is a fabulous community on facebook – join it there to partake in blogging threads, etc if you are keen to read some fantastic bloggers and be read by them too!!

Those three would be my favourites too. I did the A to Z once but April is a hectic month for me – kids’ exams plus travel – so I really need to plan if I want to do it again. I love the WT festival of words because that’s the first time I ever took up a challenge, way back in 2014 I think, so I have an emotional connect with it. Also, the prompts are comfortably writable. I like the Barathon for the opposite reason – the prompts make me sweat.

Wow I had no clues about blogging communities in 2014…. I have missed out a huge growth spurt and am making for the lost itme now 😉 I am so happy to connect with you Tules and look forward to spending some time together on one of these challenges.

I adore BAR, but haven’t yet been able to participate in the BAR-a-thon. Hopefully soon. And AtoZ is my absolute favorite. I participated once, and fell in love. Though by May I was so exhausted I felt I needed to hibernate for a LONG time. But then I was also a newbie blogger back then. Hopefully things will be different the second time around.

Tell me about the exhaustion- but I guess it would be normal to feel so. I love AtoZ – its really made me stretch my writing boundaries and also discover some great bloggers. I end up taking a May break from blogging post it- but find it very worth it and will be doing next year’s too!!!

I hope to see you at the Barathon next year! I simply love the prompts!

I liked all the challenges you mention too and I think I found you and several others through the A to Z challenge. I agree with the FoW and the views on mum blogs that promote products. I can do mum blogs that relate to life but not those that are selling products. I do think they were looking at changing that rule about groups